TranscendentalismLesson - Important People

Important People:
Who are transcendentalists?
---- Transcendentalists are people who were attempting to create a uniquely American body of literature. They were struggling to define spirituality and religion which led to the account of new understandings, made during their age.

Ralph Waldo Emerson	- An American lecturer, philospher, essayist, and poet, best remembered for leading the Transcendentalist movement. He was a champion of individualism and he spread his thoughts by publishing dozens of essays and more than 1,500 public lectures across the U.S.
Henry David Thoreau	- An American author, poetm abolitionist, naturalistm tax resister, development critic, surveyor, historian, philosopher, and leading transcendentalist. He is best known for his book Walden; a reflection upon simple living in natural surroundings, and his essay, Civil Disobedience, an agrument for individual resistance to civil government in moral opposition to an unjust state. - Firmly believed in the power of self-reliance and individual thought - Held that people should act according to their own beliefs, even if they had to break the law
Emily Dickinson	- Some poems of Emily Dickinson seem to be transcendental, yet not quite. She appears to search for the universal truths and investigate the circumstances of the human condition: sense of life, immortality, God, faith, place of man in the universe.
Margaret Fuller	- Her full name was Sarah Margaret Fuller Ossoli. She was an American journalist, critic, and women's rights advocate associated with the American transcendentalism movement.
Theodore Parker	- An American Transcendentalist and reforming minister of the Utarian church. A reformer and abolitionist, his words and quotes which her popularized would later inspire speeches by Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King.
Harriet Martineau	- An English social theorist and Whig (British Political Party) writer, and she is often known as the first female sociologist. "'When one studies a society, one must focus on all its aspects, including key political, religious, and social institutions'". She also believed an analysis of a society should be required to have an understanding of women's lives. Martineau changed sociological opinions on issues previously ignored, such as marriage, children, domestic and religious life, and race relations.
James Martineau	- A Unitarian minister and educator, and a widely influential theologian and philosopher. He wrestled with questions concerning the Bible, sources of authority, the meaning of Christ, the validity of non-Christian religions and the roles of reason and conscience. He helped to shape both Unitarian and general religious thought.
Thomas Wentworth Higginson	- An American Unitarian minister, author, abolitionist, and soldier. He was active in the American Abolitionism movement during the 1840s and 1850s, identifying himself with disunion and militant abolitionism.